“Liam!” a voice shouted from the crowd — one of his lead investors, a man known for his ruthlessness. “What is the meaning of this? My firm just lost eighty million dollars in the last sixty seconds!”

Liam spun around, hands flailing. “It’s a glitch! It’s a smear campaign! Eleanor, tell them! Tell them we’re family!”

Clara stepped out from behind a decorative pillar. She looked like a different woman — the slumped shoulders gone, the fear in her eyes replaced by a cold, crystalline clarity.

She walked toward Liam, and for the first time in their marriage, he was the one who shrank back.

“We aren’t family, Liam,” Clara said, her voice carrying across the silent crowd.

“Family doesn’t forge signatures. Family doesn’t create shell companies like Blue Lantern to hide toxic debt and then put it all in their spouse’s name so she can go to prison while you run off with a mistress.”